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Yeah, I know! My bf and a friend of his were discussing the possibility of the first gay president of France in 4 years (the current mayor of Paris who's pretty popular) and he asked me if there ever was a gay president in America. I said possibly Buchanan, but he was the worst president ever... until 7 years ago.

I was responding to five and six came up. I do think Lincoln rather liked himself. His wife? I don't know. When she overspent dramaticly during the Civil War on a refurbishment of the White House Lincoln was on record berating her as he still had soldiers in the field without blankets. If you sleeping cozy you won't need a blanket though.

As I read through the comments and reflect on this whole issue of "claiming" Lincoln or "un-claiming" Buchanan (James, not Pat--I think none of us would claim Pat), or Roy Cohn or J. Edgar Hoover I'm struck by the shear genius of Colbert's piece by using humor to get the viewer to reflect on how we go about labeling people (whether that are albatresbians, nudes or Negro presidents) as opposed to how people choose to label themselves.

James Buchanan was the only graduate of my alma mater, Dickinson College, who later went on to become president of the U.S. and, I have to say, while it's not up front in the college brochures we don't exactly disown him just because he botched the run-up to the Civil War.

Although Buchanan lived in an era where what went on between his bedsheets was simply not spoken about or even labeled (imagine a world without the label "homosexual") that very same climate seemed to give him a freedom of sorts to live openly and without discrimination with a man who was his closest and dearest friend. Now we don't know who was the top and who was the bottom or if they were into leather or liked toys, thank god! People back then just didn't talk about such things whether they did them or not.

Today, however, in post-sexual revolution America, we can hop on our computers and chat endlessly about foreplay and foreskin and we can read about the kinkiest sex acts of our most reviled movie stars and our most revered leaders. On the other hand, since nowadays we are all so into each other's pants and panties, GLBT folk have to fight for the right to work or serve in the military without fear of discrimination or termination, have to mount enormously expensive and sometimes failed lobbying efforts to end hate crimes and have to work tirelessly to secure the right to have our unions recognized under the law.

Don't get me wrong, I'm queer; I'm here, and I wouldn't have it any other way. It took me 46 years to bust out and I ain't going back no how, no way.

It would seem, though, that by hopping out of the cold comfort of the closet we've found ourselves sweating out on the front lawn where any and every redneck, fundie or heterosexist can take drive by potshots at us.

Ultimately, though, how "out" one chooses to be, one's sexual identity, is an individual and personal decision with all sorts of trade-offs. The last thing we want or need is some kind of third party, arms length litmus test for sexual orientation. Sexual preference is a private matter; sexual identity is, by it's very nature, a public matter.

So James Buchanan may have had a things for guys--we don't know for sure because he never came out pro or con on the whole subject of fellatio or rimming or nipple play--and, frankly, that's his business and he's dead. I would think it would be more valuable for historians to chronicle his political missteps than speculate about his bedroom dance steps. I also think the GLBT community is better served by looking for role models and historical figures who openly identify(ied) themselves as GLBT because those our the folks who are truly going to make a difference in our struggle for integrity, respect and equality. Playing the "let's out so-and-so" game just doesn't help anyone anymore, if it ever did.

Unfortunately, all that being said, I still have to live with the reality that James Buchanan and I both went to the same college.

Hey, taking the discussion beyond presidents, did y'all know that according to a Nova segment the other night on PBS, Sir Isaac Newton never married, shared a room with his best friend for some 20 years and (according to other internet sources) suffered a "nervous breakdown" when said best friend left England and moved to the Continent....

Leaves me wondering if the man credited as the one of the greatest scientific geniuses of all time was one of ours.